Wednesday, 23 February 2011

mICHEal Clark cOMPANY! : Come,been,gone.

Lowry: fRi 28th Jan 2011: DanceI went to see this performance of Micheal Clarks new piece in January,i loved it and i'm not quite sure why i'm only just blogging this now....Perhaps i was in shock because it was a projection of exactly what i would love to choreograph and design. The bold outfits of latex and lycra in orange,sliver,gold emphasises the dynamism of the iconic Lou Reed,Brian Eno and Bowie soundtrack. The movment was similar to tim Rushtons' in that it was intricate,surreal,however much easier to understand despite having no idea of theme despite are own interpetations ( the programmes were far too expensive.) I do get the impression that Micheal Clark may a bit up his own arse,due to the pretencious 'i only use highly proffesional dancers' monologue, on his website. However,the strong technique of these dancers does heighten the impressiveness of the work but maybe Clark could be more naturilist and human sometimes in his movement. We arrived 6 minutes late to the show ( burger kings fault) and we were told at the doors that the choreographer had a strict late policy, we were forced to sit outside and watch the first piece on a crackling t.v screen. Hence my impression of his character.Thus I wasn't overly impressed by the first piece,also it was much slower,darker and static than the other pieces,with no electric soundtrack. The preceeding two acts brought the audience alive,with people twitching in ther seats to David Bowies' iconic music.Despite a varied array of movement material and outifts, the 'starman' section of the second half left a lot to be desired in terms of design creativity, the video for the song was projected in a very basic way into the right side of the stage,the movment seemed very overpowered by the music (which may have been the intention) and i felt that the projection could have filled the stage,the floor, the centre back...anywere and anyway other than how it was done. This is a harsh criticsim but nevertheless something that i felt most of the audiecne woudl have agreed with,despite this the final act definatley made up for any slight misgivings in the first two sections. Once again the choreographer left the most vibrant piece till last. The use of costume in the final piece and some of the seciond included; head pieces,bright colours and a surreal all in one sliver glitter suit. The use of cannon (choreographic device,if you don't know that term,)repeptition of motifs and shows of extreme strength on a ballet bar.